Every 6 months we will be hosting the Without Walls radio show on Hard Knock Radio every 4th Friday of the month from 4-5pm.
You can hear us on January 25th and July 25th, 2008. You can listen on KFCF 88.1 FM in the Central Valley, KPFA 94.1 in the Bay Area, or listen online to the Hard Knock Radio archives for that day at kpfa.org . We encourage women and transgender people inside to send us your poetry and writing to share on the air.
Category: Issue 35 – Spring/Summer 2007
On March 28 over 200 former prisoners, loved ones of prisoners, and allies gathered in Sacramento for a rally and lobby day organized by Families to Amend California’s Three Strikes (FACTS) and Coalition for Effective Public Safety (CEPS). Those most affected by the prison system meet with legislators to oppose Governor Schwarzenegger’s multi-billion dollar prison expansion plan and offer solutions to the crisis and the damage it has caused our communities such as parole reform, compassionate release, treatment instead of prison for people with substance abuse issues, and abolishing life without the possibility of parole sentencing for juveniles.
CCWP held its third annual Family Visiting Day event in February, providing transportation from Oakland and Los Angeles to Central California Women’s Facility and Valley State Prison for Women. The response this year was bigger than any previous year (we received information for over 800 visitors while we had the capacity for only 170) showing the enormous desire of prisoners in Chowchilla and their loved ones to visit one another. Many loved ones of prisoners need assistance in getting to the prisons, as the cost and distance of the trip is often too much, especially considering the disproportionate number of people from poor communities and communities of color being locked up.
The Archdiocese Catholic Center in downtown LA and Friends Outside graciously provided use of their facilities. Whole Foods, Rainbow Grocery Cooperative, Primo?s coffee, Veritable Vegetables, Noah?s Bagels, Trader Joe?s, and Safeway donated snacks and drinks for the long drive to the prisons. We provided three photo ducats to each prisoner’s visitors, and took everyone out to dinner after the visit so we could all relax, eat, and socialize with other Family Visiting Day participants and CCWP volunteers.
While the days were very long and tiring for everyone involved, the joy of being able to see and touch a loved one inside meant so much to all who participated. Our connections to family members and loved ones of the people inside were strengthened and we hope to stay in touch and work collectively with them to challenge the unjust conditions of confinement that women, transgender, and gender variant prisoners in women’s institutions face as well as the racist, classist, and sexist society that puts them there.
Some comments Family Visiting Day participants made about what the event meant to them:
It’s something very important because I have no other way of coming to visit my daughter.
A whole lot of love happiness and communication.
It meant getting together with other people that understand what you?re going through because they are in the same situation.
It?s always important to see our family member and to participate in the cause to better things for the inmates and their families.
A way to meet other families going through the same thing.
It mean a lot to us because without this program we wouldn’t be able to see her.
In addition to these heartfelt comments, in the weeks following the event we received numerous letters from the prisoners who were able to get a visit, expressing their gratitude and joy. The people who wrote to us from inside shared:
A lot of us women hadn’t seen our families. If it wasn’t for your great efforts of putting this visit together who knows if we would ever see them again. Thank you so much.
I just wanted to write a personal thank you for caring enough to bring my dear mom to see me. I hadn’t seen her in 7 years, then you wonderful people made it possible.
I’m still so jazzed…very happy.
This visit changed the remaining of my time left here at Chowchilla thanks to you. You made it possible for my kids and my precious mother to come visit me and for this I will forever be greatful to all of you. My older son is 17 years old and he was doing bad in school but after that visit he’s getting A’s?my other boy is 14 years old and you also made his day. His birthday is in February so he got to see his mom. Thank you so much.
I will never forget this. It has made me a better person to know someone cares.
This event reminds us every year how meaningful it is for people in prisons to see their children, families, and loved ones outside and break down the barriers and isolation that the system is set up to create. CCWP is committed to doing whatever we can to keep these connections strong.
An interview with Kris at VSPW
Question: How would you define your gender?
Answer: People consider me a man, but I consider myself me and free.
Q: How are you seen at VSPW?
A: I don’t fit ever. Most cops don’t like me. A lot of older women don’t like me, then some get to know me and then like me. It’s hard because my look might be like the incredible hulk, but on the inside, I’m more like a teddy bear.
Q: How do you experience your gender at VSPW?
A: It’s overwhelming. I get a lot of attention from girls here, especially with the way I look, people want to be around me. I think they like my company because it feels like being around their man. Also I get a lot of negative treatment from the cops. If I don’t fight back, they become more aggressive, trying to make me react. Even if I don’t react, they keep bugging me.
Q: Does how you look ever stop you from getting things you need or want?
A: Every single day. Sometimes I’ll ask a girlie-girl to get supplies for me.
Q: Do you get support from other people inside when you face discrimination?
A: Usually I feel supported. If I need something one of my girlier friends will help me out – from something as simple as needing a chemical to clean my room, to something as hard as asking for a room change. If I ask alone, it will never happen.
Q: How do the cops approach you?
A: The cops can never tell me to shave my face because I have a chrono for hormones that will never expire, so they can’t touch me. I think some officers are jealous because I have better facial hair than they do. I think my experience with cops is more intense than other “inmate aggressives” (a term cops use to describe more masculine people in women’s prisons) because I grow facial hair – a complete beard, nothing partial, the whole grandpa hook-up – so they trip out.
Q: Why do you think the cops treat you the way they do?
A: I think we’re treated like this because they’re intimidated by us. Because they think we look more like them, they want to treat us more aggressively. They’re intimidated by our gender difference and I think they’re afraid. I see it as a territorial battle.
Q: How do you know cops are intimidated by “inmate aggressives”?
A: On my fourth day here, I was 19 years old and I was trying to get a room change. They wouldn’t listen to me so I refused to lock-in. Twenty cops attacked me and I went to jail on a “battery”. I wasn’t trying to fight anyone, I was just trying to ask for something I had the right to ask for. They found me guilty, locked me up for 53 days, then they dropped the charges. Later, the sergeant came up to me and apologized, he stated he was scared about how I would react so he took it to the next level. He was scared about how I look! The cops just react on how you look. They don’t allow you to say anything, it’s not about your personality.
Q: Are you treated differently inside prison than you were outside, when it comes to how you look?
A: On the streets, people treated me more like a real person. Here people treat me like I’m beneath them. Here there is no in between because there’s always someone above you. Remember that!
Becoming a Trans Ally
* Seek information about transgender identities and organizing being done by transgender communities. There are many organizations with information and resources.
* Acknowledge, examine, question, challenge and change transphobia in yourself, friends, loved ones, people you work with and people who are involved in groups or organizations you are a part of.
* Don?t assume you know what pronoun a person uses. If you do not know, ask. Recognize and use the pronoun that each person feels comfortable with. If you make a mistake, just apologize. Everyone makes mistakes sometimes.
* Integrate transgender-friendly/conscious language into everyday conversations, and into your messages and materials if you are a part of a group or organization